1. Field of the Invention
The field of the invention is fire suppression, or, more specifically, methods, apparatus, and products for in-computer fire suppression.
2. Description of Related Art
The development of the EDVAC computer system of 1948 is often cited as the beginning of the computer era. Since that time, computer systems have evolved into extremely complicated devices. Today's computers are much more sophisticated than early systems such as the EDVAC. Computer systems typically include a combination of hardware and software components, application programs, operating systems, processors, buses, memory, input/output devices, and so on. As advances in semiconductor processing and computer architecture push the performance of the computer higher and higher, more sophisticated computer software has evolved to take advantage of the higher performance of the hardware, resulting in computer systems today that are much more powerful than just a few years ago.
Computers often short circuit causing small fires in the computer. In the event of a high impedance short circuit inside a server or other computer, the power supply over-current detection may not function properly. Since the power supply doesn't detect such an over-current condition, the power supply continues to supply current. Depending on the location of the short on the system board, a fire can result until either the high impedance short opens completely or shorts completely, at which time the power supply over-current detection circuit shut the power supply down. Such small fires in a server or other computer often do not produce enough smoke to set off a smoke detector until the fire has spread to the point of endangering other servers and computers.